Page 126 of Never Alone
I'd come because I wanted to come. That was new—wanting to be in the same truck as a man, on the way to an errand, for no other reason than that he was in it. I'd been letting myself want things lately. Coffee at the counter with him in the morning. His hand at the small of my back on the way out of a room. The quiet of a Tuesday in our apartment, when nothing was being asked of either of us.
Sean was at the counter when we came in.
"There you are."
"Sean."
"You bringing me the rest of that list?"
"Last of it."
Cole pulled the list out of his back pocket and set it on the counter. Sean read it without picking it up, the way Sean read most things. He nodded twice. He glanced at me.
"Good to see you, Tessa."
"You, too."
"How's the house?"
"Almost done."
He turned and went through the door behind the counter. Cole followed him with the cart. I stayed at the front and looked out the window onto Sean's lot—gravel, two pickup trucks, the hand-painted sign Sean's wife had done twenty years back.
It was a good day. Bright, cool, the kind of late-winter morning that had no announcement in it.
Cole came back through with the cart loaded. Sean had something on his shoulder he'd thrown in for free. Cole protested. Sean waved him off.
"Get out of my shop, Weston."
"Sean."
"Out."
Sean held the door for us. I went first, Cole behind me with the cart. The bell on the door rang.
We loaded the truck.
Cole did the heavier work—the cans, the lumber, the pipe—and I handed him the smaller things from the cart. The trim. The bag of pulls. We had a rhythm now. He took the heavier end. I caught the lighter.
When the bed was full, he came around to my side and opened the door for me.
"In you go."
I climbed up. The seat was warm from the sun. He shut the door behind me.
I heard the footsteps before I saw anything.
Cole turned.
There was a man behind him. Black hood. Ski mask. The man came at him low, a shove with both hands, and Cole went sideways against the bed of the truck. Another man stepped into the gap between Cole and my door. A third stood at the driver's side, his hand flat against the glass.
The cold started low and went up fast.
"Cole—"
I grabbed for the door handle. The man at my window leaned his weight into the door. The handle moved in my hand, and the door didn't.
Cole came up off the bed of the truck and went for the man at my door.
